The Stark County Democrat. [volume] (Canton, Ohio) 1833-1912, 1887-10-06

enough and desperately wicked. I have
had fun illimitable, though | never swore
one oath, and never gambled for so much
as the value of pin, and never saw the in
slde ot a haunt OF sin save as when ten
years ago, with commissioner of police and
detective and two elders Of my church,
explored these cities by midnight, not ont
Of curiosity, but that might in pulpit dis
courses set before the people the poverty
and the horrors of underground city Hfe,
Yet though never was intoxicated for an
instant, and never committed one act of
dissoluteness, restrained only by the grace
of God, without which restraint l would
have gone headlong to the bottom of in
fanny, have had 80 much fun that don't
believe there is O man on the planet
in the present time who has had
more. Hear it, men and boys, women and
girls, all the fun is on the side of right.
Sin may seem attractive, but it is deathful,
and like the manchineel, a tree whose dews
are poisonous. The only genuine happi-
ness is in an honest Christian life. The
Chippewa, wanting to see God, blackens
his face with charcoal and fasts till he has
vision of what he calls God. My God I
can see best when take my hat off and let
the sunshine blaze in my face, and after a
reasonable breakfast. He is not a God of
blackness and starvation, but of light and
plentitude, and the glory of the MONDAY
sun is Egyptian midnight compared to 1t.
There they go-two brothers. The one
was converted year ago in church, one
Sunday morning, during prayer, or sermon,
or hymn. No one knew 1t at the time. The
persons on either side of him suspected
nothing, but in that young mans
soul this process went on: Lord,
here / am, young mun amid the
temptations of city life, and am afraid to
risk them alone; come and be my pardon,
and my help save me from making the
mistake that some of my comrades are
making, and save me now." And quicker
than a flash God rolled Heaven into his
soul. He is Just as Jolly as he used to be,
is just as brilliant as he used to be. He
can strike ball or catch one as easily as
before he was converted. With gun or
fishing rod in this summer vacation he was
just as skillful as before. The world is
brighter TO him than ever. He appreciates
pictures, music, innocent hilarity, social
life, good jokes, and has plenty of fun,
frst-class fun, glorious fun. But his
brother is going down hill. In the morn
ing his head aches from the champagne
debauch. Everybody sees he is in rapid
descent. What cares he for right, or
decency or the honor of his family name?
Turned out of employment, depleted in
health, cast down in spirits, the typhoid
fever strikes him in the smallest room on
the fourth story of fifth rate boarding
house, cursing God, and calling for his
mother, and fighting back demons from his
dying pillow, which is besweated and torn
to rags. He plunges out of this world with
the shrek of a destroyed spirit. Alas for
that kind of fun! 1t is remorse. lti dis
pair. 1t is blackness of darkness. 1t is
woe unending and long reverberating, and
crushing az though all the mountains of all
continents rolled on him in one avalanche.
My soul, stand back from such fun. Young
man, there is no fun in shipwrecking your
character, no fun in disgacing your
fathers name. There is no fun In break
ing your mothers heart. There is no fun
in the physical pangs of the dissolute.
There is no fun in the profgate's death
bed. There is no fun in an undono eter-
nifty. Paracelsus, out of the ashes of
burnt rose, said he could recreate the rose,
but he failed in the alchemic undertaking,
and roseate life once burned down in sin
can never again be made to blossom.
Oh, this plumb line of the everlasting
right! God will throw it over all our lives
to show us our moral deflections. .Ged
will throw it over all churches TO show
whether they are doing Useful work or are
standing instances of idleness and pre-
tense. He will throw that plumb line over
all nations to demonstrate whether their
laws are just or cruel, their rulers good or
bad, their ambitions holy or infamous. He
threw that plumb line over the Spanish
monarchy of other days, and what became
of her? Ask the splintered hulks of her
overthrown armada. He threw the plumb
l line over the French imperialism, and
| what was the result? Ask the ruins of her
Tuileries, and the fallen column of the
Place Vendome, and the grave trenches of
Sedan, and the blood of revolutions of diR-
ferent times rolling through the Champs
Elysees. He threw that plumb line over
ancient Rome, and what became of the
realm of the CAESARS? Ask her war eagles,
with beak dulled and wings broken, flung
helpless into the Iiber. He threw it over
the Assyrian empire of thou
sand years, the thrones of
Semiramis, and Sardanapalus, and
Shalmaneser, Of twenty even victorious
expeditions, the cities of Phi nicia lkneeling
to the scepter, and all the world blanched
in the presence. What became of all the
grandeur? Ask the fallen palaces of
Khorsabad and the corpses of her $4,000
soldiery slain by the angel of the Lord in
one night, and the Assyrian sculptures of
the worlds museums, all that now remains
of that splendor before which nations
throwing that plnnb line over this Ameri-
can republic, and It is solemn time with
this nation, and whether We keep His Sab
baths or disAonof them, whether righteous
ness or iniQuity dominate, whether we are
Christians or intdel, whether we fulfill
our mission or re use it, whether we are
for God or against Him, wen decide
whether we snail as a nation 20 on in
higher and higher career or 20 down in the
same grave where Babylon, and Nineveh,
and Thebes, aud Assyria are sepulchered.
But, say you, iii there be nothing but
q plumb line what can any of us do, for
there is and old proverb which truthfully
declares: If the best mans faults were
written on his forhead it would make him
pull his hat over his eyes, What shall we
do when, according to Isaiah, God shall
lay judgment to the line and righteousness
TO the plummet2" All, here is where the
gospel comes in with Saviours righteous
ness to make up for our deficits. And
while see hanging on the wall plumb
line, see slso hanging there CROSS. And
while the one condemns us the other saveb
us, if only we-will hold toit. And here
and now you may be set free with more
glorious liberty than Hampden, or Sidney,
or Kosciusko ever fought for. Not
out yonder, or down there, or up here,
but Just where you are you may get it. The
invalid proprietress of a wealthy estate in
Scotland visited the continent Of Europe
to get rid of her maladies, and she went to
Baden Baden and tried those waters, and
went to Carlsbad and tried those waters,
and went to Hamburg and tried those
waters, and instead of getting better she
got worse, and in despair she said to a
physician: What shall do2" His re-
ply was: Medicine can do nothing for